


Wood's Song

by ItsAutumnHereFriend



Series: Home Is A Silent Oath [1]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: And he loves you lots, Eskel gives you gifts, F/M, Fluff, Longing, That's it that's the fic!, Yearning, a bit of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-07-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 18:40:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25121020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ItsAutumnHereFriend/pseuds/ItsAutumnHereFriend
Summary: Through his absence, your cottage has taken residence to a few trinkets he's given you. To fill the longing, you know. Almost like a promise.
Relationships: Eskel (The Witcher)/Original Character(s), Eskel (The Witcher)/Original Female Character(s), Eskel (The Witcher)/Reader
Series: Home Is A Silent Oath [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1819714
Comments: 3
Kudos: 41





	Wood's Song

**Author's Note:**

> I love Eskel so much. I just want to hold his hand and hug him :(

Sunlight warms the folded parchments on your table. The light makes lingering dust visible, and has long since laid claim on the oak, leaving only letters and its guardian left untouched.

There is no name to attach to its sender, but the handwriting is as familiar as the wake of light you wait for. It’s steady in its strokes, words written around a litany of ink-layed patches. You can imagine Eskel cursing with every drop of ink that manages to slide off the words lingering on his tongue, the splattering of ink that betrays his hesitance.

It’s almost as if the very comfort of the sun shares what can’t be written in ink, and lingers on your fingertips as you hold them close. 

The letters are not a mountain of his devotion. It’s nothing but warmth and never in piles of abundance. They are, after all, trade secrets, most he can’t afford to indulge. These letters, you think, allow privy to a reminder he keeps to himself: the snow will melt, and although the sun may scorch, Eskel will return.

A small, wooden wolf sits patiently for the return of its ward. It’s nicked and ill proportioned in some places, made from clumsy hands that can’t belong to a master carver. Yet it befits a protector. Scars that show hard battles won, and your hand to smooth over lingering phantom pains.

You smile at the wolf and sip the cooling tea beside it. Your eyebrows knit together, its taste unknown to your tongue, but laves over its flavour with a bitter hum; the way your cottage creaks under the wind, and the trees undulate with the same song that had once been an irritable one. Now with Li’l Bleater, there are days when she croons along, and it has only tempted you to sing with her.

Wood groans as you move to stand before a chest stuffed with dried petals and loosely contained tea. Often you tell him his blend could rival even the most popular of tea masters, often he laughs and claims he already is one. You gather more for another cup later.

The floorboards creak when Li’l Bleater’s cry startles the quiet--as quiet as it could get with screaming wood. 

Placing the letters back for the wolf to protect, a small tap against its head in mimic of a pat grounds you in its routine. You squint through the spatter of sunlight, the groaning of wood under your feet an odd rhythm as it melts into the rustle of leaves.

The reeds whistle as the wind drawls. It kisses over your skin gently, playful enough to tousle carefully braided hair into stranded wisps curling over your cheeks. 

Among the garden beds and plants coaxed to sprout, Li’l Bleater bleats and prances when your shadow befalls her. She butts her head against your thigh. A gasp settles into the air, displacing the rhythm of wood and reed, though the smile on your lips cannot be misplaced. Smoothing over her fur, it calms her to the beat of swaying flowers.

You frown when she cries again. "A friend would do you good. It's not healthy for you to be so solitary," you coo when she flails her head, trying to catch your hands.

“Maybe we should go and find another. A farmer was selling.”

His voice carries and settles within the wind. Deep and rough, but always with an edge of gentleness, of softness that blooms around you just as eagerly as flowers do in the wake of the sun. Just as the dawning sun touches the flowers, Eskel comes to you like he’s his own cloven patch of light.

Ears perked, Li’l Bleater worms her way out of your embrace and hops into Eskel’s.

“Missed you too, li’l buddy.” Eskel curls over her, squatting to smooth over her fur and manages to wrangle a barely there kiss on her head as she squirms.

“And what of me, dear witcher?” You say with a teasing grin curled on your lips.

Eskel heaves up, scars stretch and pull against his lip, showing glints of teeth as he smiles. When he stands close enough to breathe you in, his hands hesitate, wary of boundaries cultivated within his absence. It’s only when your hand cradles his cheek does he lay his hand on yours, a mumbled “I’ve missed your cheese” befalls the space between.

Laughter sings in counter-melody to wood and whistle. His hands, once carrying the weight of his swords, fall into your warmth until finally his touch becomes oath and prayer.

“I’ll have you know it’s to perfection now.”

Eskel chuckles, a deep rumble felt even within your own chest. “Oh, is it?”

“Simply ask the villagers, they’ll attest to fact.”

Eskel continues to smile, a hand thumbing at your chemise, fingers splayed over your belt until both your hands rest on his cheeks and you're dragged into his embrace.

His lips are chapped but it matters not when all you can taste is the crest of waves kissing sand, snow that reaches its peak before melting and giving into heat, and prayer to guide the lost, to guide him back.

A gasp of air is shared between the sliver of space that rests between. His forehead leans against yours. When he shuts his eyes, you can feel the stiffness of his shoulders tumble and crash into the familiarity of your embrace, and finally his ink stained guilt is speechless. His body is pressed against yours in the only way he knows how to share his burdens, and it is the very same when he rests his blades against your door. 

For a brief moment, dust settles onto them, and it is frozen in the confines of your longing. Imprisoned in the way you ache.

"Come," you say instead, "let's take off that armour of yours."

The ever creaking of wood say their plain “hello” when Eskel enters and moves to your room. You follow the way his gaze falls onto the wooden wolf’s perch. He rubs at the scar sketched into his skin as you step in front of him to unbuckle his armour.

“It keeps me safe,” you murmur softly, armour removed one by one. “It always does.” There’s no need to glance back at the wolf to solidify its weight, not when Eskel bows his head to meet your eyes. He searches for something, but never more than what you can give. But you are never afraid of melting amber, it has never scorched, and you know it never will. His gaze softens.

It had taken time to memorize the movements of removing his armour, and now the gentle dance of your hands and his working in tandem is the only way you can offer him some semblance of routine away from the Path.

Yet there is guilt in imagining the armour--ever present, as solid as the wolf--gathering dust next to his lain swords. Lain against your door in promise, but also in promise of his inevitable absence.

You brush a fallen strand of hair out of your eyes.

The guilt pounds into you much like the creation of his swords; meant to protect with an edge to scare, to hurt. To the gods who protect the kiln, may Eskel never find the guilt buried in its pyre.

You huff when locks of hair rebel against your wants, curling and clinging against warm cheeks. Eskel’s fingertips play against your skin and tucks loose hair out of your eyes. He blinks, squints slightly against the glare of the sun behind you, hands brushing faintly across your cheek before he meets your eyes again. He turns to dig through his belongings. It doesn’t take long for him to turn and brandish a pair of wooden hair sticks. 

It weighs as heavy as the letters, and although it isn’t ink-splotched, it can’t weave around trails of lingering ink-spill to hide his unease, his guilt. The Path may coil its head away from you, and you know there’s nothing to note of his absence, not until he breaks his oath and never returns.

You brush your thumb against it. Skin catches on small indents, similar to the wolf’s construction.

You unravel wind-kissed braids, pinning your hair back with his gift. He watches, his calloused hand stoking the fires of your cheek. “Pretty,” he says when you turn your head for him to see.

You breathe deeply, feeling the swell of your heart just about to burst, and instead cup his hand in yours to hide the overwhelming warmth. A kiss to his palm, as if he could pocket it and carry a piece of you wherever he goes. Just like you keep a part of him within the wooden wolf, the petals and the tea, the book you continue to read to its completion every winter, one Eskel never asks for its return. 

“It…” He starts slowly, finding the words within your lips. “Reminded me of you.”

Your thanks is swallowed by his lips. Every breath is captured within his, from the stutter of your heart and to the marrow of your bones. His hands rest on your back and waist, squeezing as if he were a cat kneading. Your own are mussing up his hair and trailing along the ridges of his scars. When you push against him, he grins into the kiss and follows. You lead him with a shadow of a dance to a chair near the hearth of your room. He sits and you clamber with his movements, claiming your rightful spot on his lap.

Eskel’s hands settle on your waist, dipping against the plush of your hips as his gaze wanders over your features, sharing a smile that spreads between you two. He burrows his nose between the crevice of your neck and shoulder, inhaling your scent. You hold him, wanting him closer still.

Between your embrace and the wood’s song, the last of Eskel’s tense muscles smooth over. Its song fills the cracks of silence, both of you content to simply hold each other. 

Li’l Bleater cries again. Turning your head slightly, you catch a glimpse of the now cold tea through the nearly blinding sunlight.

You hum, feeling the scratch of his hair against your cheek. “Tea?” He pulls away slightly, but you keep him close. “I have yet to try your newest ones,” you lean back to look him in the eye. “Although I can’t imagine this one to be better than the last. You’ve made quite a blend.”

He smiles. “I  _ am  _ a master.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!  
> Scream at me at Tumblr: [ItsAutumnHereFriend](https://itsautumnherefriend.tumblr.com/)


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